The moment you start thinking it's hopeless, then it is. [But], if you think it's gonna get better, it really does. Life is a test.

I have no confidence issues with the impact or the quality of the music. No one in hip-hop, before this point and to this point, with all due respect, has done this.

Hip-hop is rock & roll. What the hell is Wu-Tang but Motorhead?

There was a time when hip-hop was its own musical principle, aside from sampling. Like the entire Wild Style break is instrumental. Kurtis Blow's earliest stuff was studio musicians playing. Whodini had a real clear sound, things like "five minutes of funk," stuff that you could write really beautiful, lush string and horn arrangements around, stuff that was just music.

When people say I don't see you enough, well just because you don't see me don't mean I don't exist or just 'cause you haven't heard me don't mean I haven't been making noise. But if I keep making noise, you'll pick up.

They say that when a man faces his destiny, the destiny ends and he becomes the man that he really is.

Make today's solid ground out of yesterday's quicksand.